Escort (A Standalone Romance Novel) (New York City Bad Boy Romance) (81 page)

“Camping?” I ask. “I
really don’t think I’m prepared for that sort of thing.”

“Not to worry,” he says,
“I have everything we’re going to need in the trunk.”

“You’ve been planning
this for a while, haven’t you?” I ask.

“A few days, yeah,” he
says.

I’m a little nervous, but
it is quite the gesture.

We exit the freeway and
drive for a little while, death metal still droning quietly in the background.
Either Dane’s forgotten about it, or he’s just
that
into me.

 
Eventually, we pull into a campground in
what’s called South Mountain Reservation. There are a few occupied spots, but
all in all, it’s pretty quiet here.

After we get everything
unpacked, one thing becomes painfully clear: he forgot to pack a tent.

He offers to run into the
nearest town and pick one up, but it’s already getting late and I’m tired.

The air is warm enough,
and we have plenty of bug spray, so we just unroll our sleeping bags and spend
the night under the stars.

As tired as I am, I can’t
keep my eyes closed. The sky is filled with more stars than I remember
existing.

For all its simplicity, getting
to know Dane a little better and lying under such a bright canopy, this is
quite probably the best night of my life.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Eyes
of the Morning

Leila

My peaceful sleep is
shattered by the piercing cacophony of an alarm clock.

With my eyes still
closed, I reach over to hit the snooze button before I realize I’m not in my
bed.

Dane is already up, and
he’s quick to silence the alarm.

“Sorry about that,” he
says. “I forgot to turn that off.”

I rub my eyes and look
around.

The sky is growing
brighter, but the sun’s not up yet. It looks like it won’t be up for a while.

“You know,” I tell him.
“I love the camping idea, but I’m not so much for the early morning.”

“It’ll be worth it,” he
says, “trust me. Are you hungry? I packed some food. We still have a bit of
time before we need to get going.”

“Get going?” I ask. “Tell
me they don’t actually kick people out of here this early in the morning.”

“No,” he says, “nothing
like that.”

“Then why the hell am I
getting up so early?”

He smiles.

“It’s a surprise.”

I don’t so much stand as
I roll and stumble to my feet. Dane pulls a peanut butter sandwich out of the
cooler and hands it to me.

We eat and Dane sprays us
both with some more bug spray.

“We should probably get
going,” he says. “It’s going to be a bit of a hike to where we’re headed.”

“And where are we going?”
I ask again.

I realize I’m pestering
him, but he’s the one who set the alarm for the pre-break of dawn wakeup.

“Just trust me,” he says.
“I promise it’ll be worth it.”

For now, I trust him, but
this better be going somewhere. In case it’s not apparent, I’m really not a
morning person.

He puts on a backpack and
we walk down the dirt path a while until we come to a trail. As I squint to see
what’s written on the sign, Dane covers my eyes with his hands.

“No peeking,” he says.

“You know that I’m
probably not going to be able to hike very well if I can’t see, right?”

“It’s just until we get
past the sign,” he says. “It’ll give away the surprise.”

I walk slowly and can
only hope that there aren’t too many signs along our way. This is pretty
ridiculous.

After what feels like ten
minutes of walking—probably closer to two—Dane removes his hands.

We hike on the main trail
for a while before the sound of water gives Dane away.

It’s not quite sunrise,
and he’s taking me to a waterfall.

I want to kiss him and
praise him for his thoughtfulness, but he’s so adamant that it be a surprise, I
don’t say anything about it.

“How are you feeling?” he
asks and my heart skips in my chest.

“I’m feeling great,” I tell
him.

“You sure?” he asks. “You
seemed pretty tired back at camp.”

I shrug.

“I woke up,” I tell him.

As the sun comes ever
closer to peeking over the horizon, my pace naturally quickens. Not knowing
exactly where we’re going, I grab Dane’s hand to give me direction.

Ahead, there’s a sign for
Hemlock Falls, and I feel myself growing warm at the thought.

“Oh shit,” he says.
“Don’t look.”

“Okay,” I say, covering
my eyes.

“You saw it, didn’t you?”
he asks.

I remove my hands.
“Yeah,” I tell him. “Trust me, though, it’s still a wonderful surprise.”

“Here’s another one,” he
says. “That’s not where we’re going.”

“It’s not?” I ask. “Then
why didn’t you want me to look?”

“Well, the cat’s out of
the bag on the waterfall part of it, but we’re going somewhere a little further
off the main path,” he says.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” he says. “I found
it one summer when my family camped up here. I’ve never heard anybody talk
about it, but I know I’m not the only person who’s found it.”

“How do you know?” I ask.

“Well, for one, I’m not
that profound a wilderness explorer,” he laughs. “For two, there’s a little
handmade sign near the plunge pool. It’s called Winterberry Falls.”

The sky is getting
brighter by the minute, and both Dane and I are jogging now.

He leads me down a tiny
dirt path that all but disappears after the first hundred feet or so, but we
keep going.

I can hear the water in
the distance, and my heart is pounding in my chest.

“We’re almost there,” he
says, but I don’t see anything.

It’s light enough that I
should be able to pinpoint where the waterfall is, but for the life of me, I
don’t know where we’re going. I can hear the roar of the water, but it seems to
be coming from a great distance.

“Just a little further,”
he says.

We’re lost. This is just
great. After the way I teased him yesterday, he’s probably going to drag us
both deeper into the woods until we can’t find our way back before he admits he
doesn’t know where…

Just ahead, the ground
drops sharply. Dane’s pace slows and we veer to the left, avoiding the steepest
part of the slope.

“Do you trust me?” he
asks, stopping in his tracks.

“I trust you,” I tell
him.

“How much?”

“Enough,” I answer.

“Close your eyes,” he
says, taking my hand.

I close them.

He leads me slowly down
the embankment, taking care to tell me what kind of terrain is in front of my
every step.

My eyes aren’t closed
very long before the ground levels beneath my feet and Dane steps behind me.

“All right,” he says.

I open my eyes, and
there, directly in front of me is the waterfall. The pool at the bottom is
rather calm as the flow of water is somewhat light. There’s a deep alcove
behind the waterfall which seems to be the reason the waterfall sounds so loud
from where we’re standing.

On this side of the
current is a little handmade sign with the words “Winterberry Falls” scrawled
across it.

“Get in,” he says. “I’m
right behind you.”

The waterfall isn’t very
tall, but it’ll more than enough for me to comfortably stand underneath it.

I step to the edge of the
water and unbutton my pants. I take off my clothes, piece by piece and shiver a
little in the cool morning air.

Naked now, I take my
first step into the pool.

The water’s cool, but not
freezing.

The rocks beneath my feet
are smooth from decades of erosion, and I slowly make my way into the falling
water itself.

Although it’s not a
deluge, the water presses me down in a firm massage. It’s when I turn around
and come out of the current enough to see that I want to cry.

Ahead of me is the stream
issuing from the waterfall, and the trees are sparse around it. Directly ahead
is the brightest spot on the horizon, the patch of sky where the sun is going
to make its appearance, and the clouds above are already turning shades of
purple and pink with the closing proximity of the sunrise.

It quickly becomes obvious
that sex
in
the waterfall is going to
be a bit much to handle with the force of the water itself, but only a few feet
into the alcove is a mostly smooth, mostly flat rock.

I walk over to it and
turn back toward the opening. There’s a good deal of mist, but the colors of
the coming sunrise are bright enough from back here to fill me with a dual
sense of peace and excitement.

“What do you think?” Dane
calls from the other side of the falling water.

“I think this would be a
lot better with some company,” I tell him.

A few seconds later and
he’s naked beside me, placing an already soaked towel onto the rock just behind
me.

“It might be a little
cold,” he says.

“That’s okay,” I tell him
and, as the mist surrounds us and the sunrise grows more intense, I wrap my
arms around him, saying, “I love you, Dane. Thank you.”

He smiles and I kiss him
tenderly.

This moment is peace and
romance and sex at once, and I lie down on the towel, wincing slightly until
the towel absorbs my heat and Dane’s on top of me now, his hair dripping wet.

I reach down between his
legs and feel him.

He’s already hard.

I’m dripping wet.

He slides into me easily
and I’m immediately plunged into a new realm of existence where there is
nothing but sensual pleasure inside and all around me.

He leans forward, kissing
me softly and as he pulls away, I can’t hear the words, but his lips say, “I
love you.”

I wrap my legs around
him, pulling him into me deeper as the first glimmer the sun catches the water,
forming prisms of light, casting colors in the spray of the waterfall.

The water is cold on my
skin, but Dane is so warm inside me.

My arms are around him,
his skin so fluid against mine.

His warmth fills me, and
as the first half of the sun comes above the horizon through the translucent
distance, I start to quiver.

With his body firmly, but
gently pressed on and into mine, I gasp as my body becomes so incredibly
sensate that every drop of water coming over the falls, every particle and wave
of light passing through grows into me.

My breasts push tight
against him with every deep breath, and my eyes are watering as the surge
permeates my body, making me feel, for a moment, immortal.

I hardly notice when my
eyes close, I’m so aware of every tattered piece of touch.

My own voice echoes in
the alcove and is washed away by the rushing torrent so close I can taste it.

When my eyes open again,
Dane is smiling above me.

I move my mouth, but can
barely form the words.

He leans in closer.

“Pick me up,” I tell him.

My limbs encompass him so
tight, so completely and he lifts me with ease. Being a true gentleman, he
turns so I’m looking at the sky over his shoulder, and I kiss his neck as this
beautiful man brings my fantasies to life.

Part of me wants him to
walk beneath the water, but the rest of me is so much more content right here
in his arms with only my thighs and gravity to careen through this other plane.

Through the open air to
the side of the waterfall, I can see the trees swaying gently in a sightless
breeze.

“I want you to come
inside me,” I tell him, my voice barely a whimper.

I kiss his neck and then
his lips, leaning back a little, but still secure in his arms.

He gazes at my breasts as
they heave with every ragged breath, and as I look out the side of the
waterfall once more, I lock eyes with a woman standing on the bank.

Adrenaline soars through
my body, but the woman just stands and watches us, her hands at her sides.

I don’t take my eyes off
of her as I press myself again into Dane’s body, the warmth in my skin
rekindled.

Dane’s erection heats my
core, and I imagine the mist as steam coming off our bodies, through which I
can still perceive that woman as she sits on the dry ground and leans back,
taking in what we’re giving off.

It’s not an attraction
that I feel for the woman, at least not a sexual one, but I lick my lips as I
lean back once more, exposing more of my body to the open air.

With both arms clasping
each other behind Dane’s neck, I roll my hips, wondering just how much that
dark-haired woman can see of us.

It’s not attraction: it’s
understanding, recognition between artist and subject, though I can’t claim to
know who is who.

Dane holds me with only
one arm now as with the other, he guides my breasts, one by one, into his
smoldering mouth.

I tilt my head back,
allowing him greater access to me and my hair hangs down, heavy with water,
behind me.

The woman on the shore is
still there, her eyes ever intent on mine, and I start to climb toward that
threshold once more.

Dane feels the quickening
of my breath and he lifts me, his whole length entering and then retreating
again and again, the sounds of our love crackling against the walls of the
nook.

“You’re slipping,” Dane
tells me, and I immediately pull myself against him once more.

The shock of his words,
any words, delays my gratification and I tell him to lie down on the towel
behind me.

He turns around slowly,
every step deliberate, until he can sit on the edge of the rock. I lean forward
as he leans back and he rotates his body just enough for the whole of him to
lie back.